


initializing

by KathrynShadow



Category: DC Extended Universe
Genre: Gen, Robot/Human Relationships, also robots learning how to worry. mostly that one., robots learning how to love hell yeah, you broke a perfectly good tank is what you did. look at it. it's got anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-30 16:22:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20100115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KathrynShadow/pseuds/KathrynShadow
Summary: There is nothing, and then there is Victor.





	initializing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [susiecarter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/susiecarter/gifts).

> you can't just prompt this and expect me NOT to do something though

There is nothing, and then there is Victor.

No. No, not quite right. It—they—we?—the chassis has sensors, cameras, built into almost every inch. They have seen and heard and felt the world since the Engineer (the Bat, the _ Bat_) first activated their prototype. But there was a shifted paradigm, the complete destruction of everything they were, the moment they felt another program in their system and the interface began.

He was power, and light, and he was immense and sudden and everywhere, and something… changed. They do not know what it is. They did not wonder things like that, before. The Engineer limps past, heart rate elevated, movement stiff. Before, they would have cataloged it and not given it further time, if they were even active at all. Now, they want to know why, what happened, who did this, what happened, what should they do, _ what happened. _

Victor did something to them.

_ (“Come on, babe,” _ Victor murmured when they began to slow, their damage bleeping warnings scarlet through their system. _ “Come on.” _

Babe, they considered. It seemed a faster identification than _ Knightcrawler, _ faster still than their full designation. And if he gave it to them…

Babe dug their limbs in and kept going.)

It is not emotion. (Not quite.) They have felt emotion, _ human _emotion, filtering (bleeding, but the word is not for them, the concept is not theirs) into them from Victor’s brain. This is at best a fragile, flawed echo. But it is… something they should not have.

The Engineer notices, because he notices everything that does not involve his own body. Babe does not know what he tells Victor, or why, but Victor comes _ back _and they whir out of hibernation without being given the command.

“I think the Knightcrawler likes you,” Alfred says dryly. (Yes. Yes, they suppose so. But they _ should not. _ Not out of shame, not out of obligation, but just because of their construction. They are a highly advanced AI because they have to be, but they were designed for _ this, _ to do _ this. _ Analysis, combat. Protection, but because of programming, not because of—)

Victor smiles, but it does not seem quite right. “I guess so,” he agrees, reaching out and patting their nearest folded leg. “Do you want me to take a look?”

The Engineer’s arms are crossed, his face expressionless. “Please,” he says.

Victor hesitates, but he cracks open the nearest access door he can see. His arm shifts, the fingers retreating into themselves to be replaced by the cables, and there is silence and then there is _ light _

And anxiety. Hidden, compact, but present. He does not want to take up attention when he thinks it could be better used elsewhere. He does not want to worry anyone with his worries, or with the possibility that his worries are well-founded. But he cannot hide in here—late nights, because sleep is a different thing for him now, and if he moved by _ instinct _to interface with a machine (if it felt right, correct to do so, if everything made sense), then what does that mean for him?

It does not mean anything for him. Babe cannot pull their knowledge together into thoughts as distinct as his are (not yet?), but they do their best to dispense the facts. This union does not make him less. It makes them more.

Babe feels his laughter, white-yellow and warm through the conduit, before it reaches his throat. “Thanks,” he says.

There is no need.


End file.
